


Florilegium

by Anonymous



Category: BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angel/Devil AU, Canon Compliant, Delinquent/Student Council President AU, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Foreplay, Future Fic, Implied/Referenced Sex, One Shot Collection, Partial Nudity, Surprise Kissing, different tags apply per chapter, revue starlight au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-18
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-01-16 00:17:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 17,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18510049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: A collection of YukiRan one-(or two- or more) shotslatest:Show [Future Fic]: A change in scenery makes Ran a little popular with some girls. Yukina doesn't take kindly to it.





	1. Competition [Future Fic]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ran and Yukina love each other a little too much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So at this point they're young adults and still trying to figure out how to actually be responsible about themselves? I kind of hc them to have mellowed out a lot... you'll basically see how exactly as you read, haha;; Anyway, enjoy!

Ran stares. Birds chirp outside, the first songs of the morning to herald the late autumn sun. Soft blue peeks over the horizon. The ceiling remains colorless in the dark of her room, and the draft from the door penetrates the thin blanket laid over her.

Her headache swells, only to ebb again. She turns inward to the warmth of her bed. Yukina.

…But she’s missing. The space where Yukina had fallen asleep next to her is empty, and the sheets had already gone cold without her.

Another waves of pain washes over Ran. She brings up an arm level to her head and rubs it in her face in a groggy effort at amelioration, then winces until it subsides. What was she doing last night that made her like this? The live? But that was nothing… and how did Yukina come into the picture?

Ran rolls onto her back again. A distant wooden rhythm, like a knife on a cutting board, bounces up the stairs and into Ran’s room. Her tenuous grip on reality allowed her the memory that her father left on an ikebana masters’ meet, which meant that…

The rhythm stops as Ran hears a clang of steel on thin tile, and a soft grunt.

Her body seems to hurry there on its own.

* * *

Yukina looks at the cut on her fingertip, holding it up from the elbow as the blood trails to her knuckles. It bleeds more than she expected for something so sudden. The knife, now on the floor, seems pristine in comparison. It puts her at an odd crossroads between rapt with interest and simply shocked.

But as if to snap her out of it, Ran’s voice comes in from the doors. “Yukina?” she says. Her hair is still a mess, and she looks almost annoyed with the way her eyebrows are knit and her eyes are squinted, but Yukina knows it’s just the light and the headache.

“Ran?” Yukina says. “I’m sorry. Did the knife wake you up?”

Ran doesn’t quite answer as she walks over to Yukina, taking the injured hand and looking over it. Her eyebrows are still scrunched, but there’s a softness in her stare. “You haven’t run it under water yet?”

“I – No, I haven’t. But it’s fine, I –“

And Yukina is led, with a hand on her back and another on her wrist, to the sink. “That’s raw fish on the cutting board, isn’t it?” she says as she gently guides Yukina’s hands beneath the faucet. “Be careful with that. Always wash it right away, just in case.”

“Of course,” Yukina says. “I was just about to.”

With just as much tenderness, Ran pulls Yukina’s hand back and shuts the faucet. It was strange. Normally, Yukina would have been upset over being… _babied_ like this, but the genuine care in Ran’s eyes and in the way she held Yukina was disarming, somehow.

_Things have really changed._

Ran seems to nod, satisfied, after looking at the cut. “I’ll get you a bandage.”

“Ran. Ran, it’s fine, I can do it myself.”

“You know where they are? They’re in the—“

“Second nightstand drawer, in your room. I know.” Yukina smiles fondly as Ran lets out a tense breath. “Why are you so worked up over this? It’s just a cut. My life isn’t in danger.”

Ran’s face wrinkles in the shy way it does when she’s asked just the right question. “Well what do you expect? I wake up with a headache missing you from my bed, and then I hear a knife clang knowing you _never_ cook…”

Yukina puts a hand on Ran’s shoulder. “So you were worried about me?”

“…Yeah? Or my kitchen, since you—“

She tugs Ran down and presses their lips together, and though she means to pull away, Ran’s arms wrap around her waist and pull her close to deepen the kiss. Yukina smiles into it, appreciating how Ran-like and familiar the move is until she decides it’s enough.

“What was that about?” Ran asks as they pull away, as if her arms still aren’t linked around Yukina.

“You’re too much sometimes, Ran,” Yukina says, “for yourself.”

“Huh?”

“Emergency errands for your family, holding a two hour live, _and_ trying to convince me you weren’t too tired for me when you got home.” Yukina pushes the hair away from her neck, where Ran can see the patches of red that she probably can’t remember leaving. “That really wasn’t your best, by the way. You should handle me a little more like you did just now, next time.”

Ran’s face turns a shade pink as she frowns. “I thought you liked that.”

“Rough, not sloppy.”

“Well, you’re one to talk,” Ran grumbles. “How long have you been up, huh?”

Yukina blinks when her mind can’t give her a number. “An hour.”

“Oh yeah? If I turn around and see lyric sheets on the table—“

But the hand on Ran’s face, keeping her from looking, is answer enough.

Ran sighs. “Yukina, it’s been four nights. You have to sleep before something happens.”

“You need your rest too,” Yukina says. “I want to do this for you.”

“I don’t want it if it’s at your expense,” Ran says. Then her stare falls to the floor and she sighs again, pulling Yukina into a hug. Her arms are strong around Yukina, but nonetheless gentle. “I don’t want _this_ to be a competition. I love you, and you turn me into a better person, so if I can keep your from hurting yourself and pay you back, just a little—“

“You do more than that, Ran.” It’s Yukina’s turn to wrap her arms around Ran, rubbing circles on her back. “You do more than that. And… you’re right. I guess I do need a break.”

After one last squeeze, Ran lets Yukina go, simply intertwining their fingers in one hand while the other – at the hand with the cut finger – stops carefully at her wrist. “Let’s go back to bed. I’ll make last night up to you.”

“Excuse me?” Yukina says with a playful chuckle. “Did you just forget everything you told me? You need your rest, too.”

“Fine, okay,” Ran says. “But when I wake up again, I better see you next to me.”

Yukina sighs fondly, then pecks Ran’s cheek. “Likewise.”


	2. Rumor [Canon Compliant]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People are talking about Ran and Yukina.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter takes place at some unknown point after the VERSUS event between Afterglow and Roselia, and also it deals with things that are kind of like real-person shipping (but not exactly?), so I just want to say beforehand that I don't condone those kinds of things! Of course I think it's fine to appreciate people's relationships and such, and to think that x and y would make a cute couple, people do that in real life, but it's a whole other thing when you start making headcanons and that kind of stuff about them or turn normal interactions into ship material.
> 
> But I you're not here to listen to me ramble about that, so on with the fic! Part 1 of 2

It’s Himari who brings it up, one lunch break.

“Look!” The phone nearly flattens Ran’s nose with the way she shoves it in her face. “That’s you guys at the park, right?”

Ran leans back to get enough distance from the screen to actually see what’s going on, and hums noncommittally. It’s tricky to tell in a photograph taken at night, but the brightness of her own red streak and Yukina’s pale lavender hair are pretty damning. More so, however, is how they walkthe cobblestone path hand-in-hand, which she assumes is what Himari is _really_ interested in.

“Yeah,” Ran says, shrugging. “And? Did you take this photo? Because it isn’t news to you.”

“No, I didn’t,” Himari says matter-of-factly. “Actually, the photographer was a fan!”

“Of Roselia or Afterglow?” Moca chimes in.

“Both,” Himari says. “And they are _stoked_ about what this could mean. This fan and several others, I mean. They’re stoked.”

Ran groans. “Look, I’m grateful for their support and all, but can they just, I dunno, mind their own business?”

“Ran, you _dumbass,”_ Himari says, scoffing. “Put yourself in their shoes for a sec. Just _weeks_ Afterglow and Roselia were at each other’s throats right?”

“Actually,” Moca adds, raising an inquisitive finger. “By now it’d be like, the two-month anniversary of our historical truce—“

“Whatever! Two months, ten seconds, same thing. It just took that much time and a joint live before the _vocalists,_ who had the most personal beef in there, are holding hands at the park?!”

Irritated, Ran pretends to blow something away from her face, arms crossed and face set in a frown as she slumps against the wooden backrest of the diner booth. “Well, what of it?”

“Well, something happened, clearly!” Himari exclaims. “The only thing that’s stopping everyone from concluding that you guys are an item is that it happened so fast!”

Moca leans forward. “Ohh, a thrilling romance full of twists?”

“ _Romance?_ Ugh…” Ran pinches the bridge of her nose. “I’m gonna get a headache.”

Moca shakes her head sympathetically. “Do you think it’s romantic, too, Hii-chan?”

“I honestly have no idea what to feel,” Himari says, unsubtly glancing to Ran, who’s levelling her with a contemptuous glare. To seem as nonchalant as she can, she leans her face on her fist and thoughtfully dips her french fry in some ketchup. “I mean, on one hand, I have to admit, your circumstances are pretty crazy, but on the other… I’ve had ten years to figure you’d hate the attention, after all.”

“Damn right I would!” Ran says it with more force than intended, and shrinks back to her seat as if in apology. “I just, geez, I don’t want people to be watching our every move, especially since we’ve just started. She and I are each other’s first, you know?”

“Ah!” Moca hand flies over her chest, as if shot. “It really is romantic!”

Himari chuckles at her while Ran’s face contorts in betrayal. “No, no, Ran, I totally get you!” She reaches over the table to try to pat Ran’s shoulder, but her arm comes up short and the gesture devolves into a strange wave. “Which is why I wanted to warn you about it today, and will be telling everyone to shut up and respect your boundaries.”

“No, I… don’t know about that. The less people who randomly know about it, the better. Even if it’s for this. That’s what my gut is telling me would be best.”

“Well, if it’s your gut we’re talking about…” Himari does a little mock salute, french fry hovering dangerously close to her brow.

Ran nods her thanks, and leans back again with a deep sigh. She has to bring this up with Yukina.

* * *

 “I don’t really care,” she says.

“You don’t _care?”_ Ran says, flabbergasted.

“Does it matter?” Yukina leans up from her bed to look at Ran, who sits pensively on the edge. “So what if they think we’re dating, or don’t? It doesn’t change our relationship or our music if we don’t let it. You’re strong enough for that, aren’t you?”

“W-Well yeah, of course, but this still isn’t really okay.”

“I suppose it is rather disrespectful—“

“More than that,” Ran says. “I don’t want to not have any privacy with you, and I don’t want people to talk about us and turn us – _us_ , “ she repeats the word suddenly looking at Yukina, emphasizing it with her hand in a gripping motion, “into their... entertainment, or whatever.”

“Entertainment? Isn’t that a bit much? It’s not like we’re Hollywood actresses, or something.”

“Yeah, but, agh…”

Ran flops onto her back, then runs a hand through her hair in distress. “Minato-sa— I mean, Yukina.”

“Ran?”

They meet eyes. When Ran sits up, Yukina follows suit, and watches as Ran turns to face her and takes Yukina’s hand in her own. Ran’s mouth opens – no, her lips just barely part – but no words come out, and the troubled look on her face sends pangs through Yukina’s heart.

“Ran…? What’s wrong?” Yukina moves to cup Ran’s cheek, make her look at her, but Ran’s hand is faster to take her wrist.

But though Yukina fears the worst, Ran looks at her with a smile on her face, and a familiar determined fire in her eyes. “You’re right,” she says. “Rumors are nothing. We can take ‘em.”

Yukina smiles back.

* * *

The next day, Ran passes by a pair of students from another school, whispering about a ‘Mitake-san conceding over a crush,’ and a ’typical cutthroat Minato-san,' and she pauses.

Breathes. Grips the strap of her bag till her fingers start to sting.

And then she keeps walking without a word.


	3. Rumor 2 [Canon Compliant]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The things they hear are getting to them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Sorry to surprise, but what I thought was going to be a two-parter ended up being a three parter, since the original "Part 2" ended up being 3000 words long, as opposed to part 1's being around 1000. Yes, this means that I actually have the whole thing written out, but to ensure the quality of the last portion (and to give me a little more time to write future chapters), I'll be putting it out a few days after this. Sorry again for the wait, and thank you for your continued support!

The day ends as any as Yukina clears up the practice room after her. She’s thorough, as she always is, putting away amps and coiling cords just as neatly as they’d been set up for her, but since it’s a Thursday, she leaves the mic stand and sets up a distortion pedal for the next party on schedule.

She finishes, looks over the room one more time, and turns the lights off, shutting the door behind her.

And like the devil, she appears.

“You’re last out?” Ran says. Her blazer is off and her sleeves are rolled to just before her elbow, which means today’s rehearsals are going to be particularly intense. Something about that makes Yukina happy, somehow.

“ _You’re_ first in?” Yukina says, stifling a smile.

Ran smirks at her, head tilting playfully. “Afterglow always starts practice together, remember? No one starts any earlier or later than anyone else.”

“Oh?” Yukina walks up to Ran, matching her smile and watching the fiery bravado start to sputter out. “Then why do you seem to have arrived ahead of them?”

At that, Ran’s smirk crumples, and she looks reticently to the side. Yukina can barely hear her mumble, “Well, what do you think?”

Yukina shakes her head, smiling to herself. “Will I see you tonight?”

Ran visibly eases at the topic being changed, which Yukina finds incredibly endearing. “I’d love to, but Dad needs some extra help today. Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Yukina says. “You’ll be there tomorrow.”

“I will,” Ran says.

Satisfied, Yukina nods at her. “Good luck with practice today. Set up for the others, hm?”

Ran huffs. “Goes without saying. We’ll do as we always do.”

As Yukina passes by her, she makes sure to squeeze Ran’s hand. Direct encouragement has never been her strong suit, but she and Ran were so quickly becoming fluent in each other’s subtleties – both being people who communicated so much with them – that she felt a little emboldened.

And after Ran squeezes back, and the door clicks shut behind her, Yukina’s heartbeat starts to settle down, and she leaves Ran to her devices.

Daylight hadn’t run out yet, with the last of it dyeing the sky Ran’s red, so Yukina decides to make the most of it and stay for a small coffee outside CiRCLE while working on some compositions.

It’s when she sits down with her thrice-sweetened latte that she can’t help but overhear, a table over, two girls. Regulars to their lives, from what fragments of the conversation she happens to pick up, and they don’t seem to have noticed her sitting behind them, given how freely they talked about Roselia.

Yukina tries to remind herself that these things aren’t worth her attention when the wind stops rustling the tree leaves nearby, and suddenly she can hear every word.

“They were around for three years, right?” one says. “I mean, picking a fight with a rookie band when you’ve been around for so long sounds like more than one attitude problem.”

“And I’ve listened to their stuff,” the other says. “They really don’t sound like people who are even in Roselia’s league. The instrumentals are barely over garage band level – maybe not even.”

Yukina mouth sets in a line. Are they talking about Afterglow?

“I mean, of course I want them to be happy and all, but… Mitake Ran? Really? Minato-san deserves someone who gives her the respect she’s due, you know?”

With every word, Yukina’s blood heats to degrees that she hadn’t felt in ages, to degrees that were so unlike her that she was almost confused. Was this how Ran felt when her music was insulted? Why was it as though Yukina was angered on her behalf? She wants nothing more than to walk over there and tell them how wrong they were about Afterglow’s music, about what Ran means to her and how she changed her after all those fights and challenges.

But that’s something Ran would do, wasn’t it? Ran was the type to jump headfirst into things when it came to defending her loved ones. It was admirable of her – it was what made her catch Yukina’s attention, all those months ago – but it wasn’t something Yukina would do. Yukina isn’t Ran.

Yukina, with her faith in herself and the people she’s close to, doesn’t let these things affect her. She knows better, and that’s all that she needs.

The girls chatter on, going along the same idea that Ran is beneath Yukina. That Ran, and choosing Ran, was a mistake.

And being Yukina doesn’t feel right anymore.

* * *

“I can’t do it after all,” Ran grumbles as she trudges up the stairs to her classroom.

Moca courteously allocates a cut of her attention away from her cheese bagel to Ran’s troubles. “Is this about that math assignment?”

“No, I finished that right in front of you, remember?”

“Might’ve been asleep.” Moca shrugs. “So what can’t you do?”

“It’s the gossip,” Ran says. “Yukina and I said we’d try to just ignore it since it’s pointless, but… Argh, it’s everywhere, and I hate it.”

Moca’s eyebrows rise. “Huh, when it came to these things I thought you were the type to be all,” she lowers her voice to a comical gruffness, “‘Who gives a swag what people say as long as it doesn’t mess with my same-as-always. Rock on, ladies and girls.’”

“Is that supposed to be me?” Ran says, scowling.

“That’s what you sound like when you’re pretending to be tough,” Moca says as they reach the classroom hall. “Oh, but I guess that does mean you actually care, on the inside.”

“Of-Of course I care…! Ugh…” Ran crosses her arms and leans on the wall. Her voice is quiet when she speaks again. “They’re making me doubt everything again.”

Moca nods. “You’re a little bitch and Minato-san is a queen who deserves better, etcetera etcetera.”

“Exactly,” Ran says. “It’s not their place to decide for her, but—”

Moca elbows Ran and points down the hallway, where Yukina, eyes trained on them, seems to be approaching.

But she doesn’t know why Yukina walks so briskly toward her. And not knowing quite what to do, she raises her hand to wave. “Ah, Mi-Minato-sa–“

As soon as she’s in range, Yukina seizes Ran’s tie, tugs her forward, and kisses her on the lips.

It’s quick, almost like a dream, and Yukina’s breathing when they part is only heavy because she’d been walking so quickly, but Ran is still flustered.

“Y-Yukina?” she stutters, almost jumping when she tries to straighten up only for Yukina’s grip on her tie to stop her cold.

“Ran.” Yukina is looking her straight in the eyes. “I love you. Understand?”

“Huh? Yeah, I know, why–“

Yukina says nothing else, turning away and walking off like nothing happened.

“Ooh~”

Ran frowns. Though she’d been too preoccupied to mind at the time, Moca _had_ seen all that, though if it weren’t for her she might’ve been convinced that it really _was_ all a dream.

“Minato-san is so forceful with you, Ran,” she says with a grin. “You should try that, too. I’m sure you’d be super hot~”

“Shut up, Moca.”

“You’re welcome,” Moca says. “But anyway… Does she always do that? Isn’t it kinda rude to just smooch someone all of a sudden.”

“As if you wouldn’t try the same thing.” Ran watches Yukina disappear up the stairs. Her footsteps are still too fast for someone normally so calm. “Something’s bothering her,” Ran tells Moca. “A lot. I’ll talk with her when I get the chance.”

“Weird way for her to deal with teen angst, but okay,” Moca says. “Whatever that was, though, it sounded good for your worries.”

Ran’s nerves come back. “I hope it is…”


	4. Rumor 3 [Canon Compliant]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yukina and Ran have an answer.

Evening falls, and Ran arrives at Yukina’s, as agreed upon and expected of her. She stands at the door to Yukina’s room, and poised to knock, but a strange, unsure feeling keeps her arm in place.

The door clicks open, making Ran jolt, and Yukina looks at her through the small opening. “Well? You _are_ coming in, aren’t you?”

“Y-Yeah. Were you waiting there, or something?”

Yukina dodges the question by urging Ran inside with a nudge of her head. She sits on her bed while Ran takes her place on Yukina’s chair.

“So… About that stunt you pulled this morning,” Ran says after a contemplative silence. “Are you alright?”

Yukina takes a moment, and shrugs. “I had to get something off my chest.”

Ran recalls what it was that Yukina said. _‘I love you.’_ She’s sure Yukina remembers, too. “And that was…?”

She glances to the wall. “There was quite a bit, really. Too much to elaborate on at the time, and I didn’t know who to tell but you.”

“Sounds… serious,” Ran says, crossing her arms. “But technically you haven’t exactly told me anything yet.”

“I expressed what I had to,” Yukina says, “but yes. There’s more to it than that single sentiment. To start with, we’re apparently more popular than expected.”

Ran’s heartbeat picks up, whether in nervousness or not, she doesn’t know. “It’s about them after all…”

“I don’t seek them out,” Yukina says, with a force in her voice as if there’s something she needs to prove urgently, “but I hear them, sometimes. Just enough to know what they say… and hate it.”

Ran is practically frozen now, hanging on to Yukina’s every word. What she has to say, what she wants to ask, she holds back for the moment.

“It’s hypocritical of me, I know, especially after what I asked of you – to just ignore them and let them say what they want about us – but… I suppose it wasn’t quite _us_ that I couldn’t stand hearing about, but _you.”_ Yukina meets Ran’s eyes. “Do you hear the same things I do?”

“The same things…? I don’t know. It’s different stuff, but… I don’t like it either.”

“What I hear,” Yukina says, “is that you aren’t worth my time, and that I’m too good for you. As you already might know, this isn’t the case, and I resent the very idea.” Her grip on her arm tightens in irritation. “Mind, this doesn’t quite mean that you were right when you brought them up, but… I agree that it should end.”

Another silence fall over them, wherein Ran thinks, long and hard, about which out of the dozens of things she wants to say, she should say. One thing sticks out.

“Why is that, exactly?” she says, treading delicately over her words. “At first, you _did_ say not to mind them. And besides, Roselia’s rep is hardly suffering from all this attention. If anything the comparison is actually flattering this time a—”

“ _Ran,_ ” Yukina says harshly. “After all that effort you put in to making me acknowledge Afterglow  – after we’d finally gotten over ourselves like this, you think I’d turn a blind eye to them dragging your name through the mud? You think I’d do such a disservice to everything we’ve been through?”

Ran meets Yukina’s eyes with a dumbstruck stare. There’s a silent standoff now, not unlike those they had in the past, when there was so much to say kept unsaid by pride.

But they know this silence isn’t the same. Yukina is patient.

And Ran lets out a breath, feeling like her shoulders were freed a great weight.

“No,” she says, shaking her head where it hangs from her neck, “no, of course not. But I never thought you’d actually tell me, you know?”

Yukina’s stare softens. “Have they been getting to you?”

“…Yeah. Guess they have.” When Ran raises her head again, her smile is bitter. “Sorry, Yukina. You’re enough, I just… don’t know if I am.”

“Do you know what you are, though?” Yukina says. “You’re stubborn. What did I say before I kissed you?”

“Uh.” Ran blinks, taken aback by the bluntness. “You said…‘I love you.’”

“And what did I say was bothering me enough to spur me to do that?”

Ran thinks back, and another, different smile alights on her face as she understands. “Okay… okay. Thanks.”

Yukina laughs, a subtle breath. “So when your faith in me suffers, so does your faith in yourself, hm?”

“Hah… I guess I still need to be told sometimes, huh?”

“Don’t worry. I will adjust to you as you adjust to me, over time.”

“That said, though…” Ran rubs her neck, as if tired. “Now that I’ve cleared my head about all this, I think I’m starting to see what’s _actually_ bothering us… and I think I’ve got an idea how to stop it.”

* * *

Their audience at CiRCLE feels no different than before everything had begun. The pre-live buzz has the usual level of energy – perhaps more, since today is the day Roselia finally opened their doors to their first onstage guest – and rather than the mindless prattling about her and Ran that her ears had grown so acclimated to, most of the chattering was excited speculation about who it was that Roselia actually allowed to perform with them.

Just a little, Yukina lets herself revel in the secret irony that the two were one in the same.

She steps back from the edge of the stage, and looks at Ran, dressed in her usual Afterglow stage outfit. “It has to come from me, huh?” Yukina says.

Ran shrugs. “People think you wear the pants in the relationship. It’d sound like I was just trying to save face if it came from me.”

“I see.” Yukina stares. “The pants… Do I?”

Ran scowls. “Bitch?”

“Guys.”

It’s Lisa. Timely as ever. When she’s confident she has Yukina and Ran’s attention, she pokes her thumb toward the rest of backstage, where the rest of Roselia seems to have finished preparing. Yukina nods and gives the usual signal.

“But you,” she says to Ran, who she knows is unfamiliar with the ‘usual’ that Roselia has, “you don’t come onstage with us.”

“I know I have a cue – this was my idea,” Ran says, slinging her guitar on. “Will I know when I see it, though?”

Yukina gives her a glance. “I do trust you to.”

Ran shrugs and turns away to check her guitar. Yukina notices, just before Ran hides it in the shadow, something like a cocky smirk. She turns, too, to hide a smile of her own.

That’s the expression that makes her heart race.

And when Yukina takes to the mic, it’s the one she thinks of.

“CiRCLE,” she says, “thank you for coming to today’s show. Before we begin – and I know this is unusual, for me, especially – there’s something I’d like to talk about, with regard to recent talk about me and a certain other vocalist that frequents this live house.”

It’s Roselia’s audience. Yukina commands the silence that sweeps over them.

“For whatever reason, the popular opinion around this community – CiRCLE – with regards to myself and Mitake Ran in particular, seems to lionize me and Roselia by extension at the expense of Mitake-san and her band, Afterglow. I’m aware that we have a history, I’m not about to pretend I have no clue where exactly the comparison came from, and, as always, I reciprocate your appreciation for us and what we do.

However. I can’t say I care much for the lack of acknowledgement these same people who praise us, deny Afterglow. As a musician and performer, I feel the need to say that it’s a grave oversight to disregard the impact that Afterglow had toward Roselia, and myself especially. As a band, they are years our senior, and as performers,” at this point, it takes Yukina a second thought to keep herself from glancing backstage, “they’ve always been able to impart to their music and their audience things that we have been seeking from the very beginning. I speak for myself now – there is no overstatement in saying that Afterglow – Mitake-san in particular – is one of my greatest inspirations, and they will continue to be so, moving forward.

If you’re truly devoted to Roselia, you will not demean the people that push us to better ourselves. You will not demean Afterglow. You will not demean yourselves.”

Yukina pauses, lets the words settle in the air. Murmurs start up, as natural, when someone from the back of the room shouts something too distant and sudden for her to catch, but rouses the live house into a single, unified crowd of cheers. It’s like music.

She gives them a smile – calm, elegant as Minato Yukina always is – as she waits for them to settle down. “Thank you,” she says. “Thank you for your support. Roselia will continue to move forward and grow, in your care. And with that being said, as you might already know, we’ve recently found it in ourselves to do collaborative performances alongside other musicians. Up first tonight, a cover performance of _Kakumei Dualism,_ a duet led by…”

Gasps and shouts of excitement cut her off, but before Yukina can even turn to look, Ran is at her side, and puts a hand over Yukina’s on the mic to pull it to her.

“This is Mitake Ran,” she says with a grin, “performing with Roselia.”

What follows is nothing short of an explosion, but the noise of the crowd feels muted and distant as Yukina sees the smile on Ran’s face, wide, brilliant with audacity and passion, feeding off the cheers like fire feeds off coal. It takes a flash of self-consciousness for Yukina to tear her eyes off it, when she notices–

“Are you tearing up?” Yukina whispers playfully.

“Shut up,” Ran answers, then it’s back to the mic, quick, like it never happened. “I’d like first to thank Minato-san for those kind words. I may not be as poetic as her, but I mean it when I say she’s as much of an inspiration to me as – as she makes me sound like I am, to her.”

Yukina tilts her head at that. So bold and fiery, yet still so timid when it comes to sentiments that she can’t embellish in song. She nudges Ran’s arm.

“This stage is where you first enraptured me,” Yukina whispers. “They deserve to see how.”

“It won’t be the same without you watching,” Ran says. The fire is back in her eyes.

"You're impossible to ignore."

A shout from the front row cuts them off, and it’s exactly what Yukina was waiting to hear. “Hey, are you guys dating or what?”

She smiles, and takes her mic back. “No. No, we aren’t.”

* * *

A week later, they share a table for two at Hazawa’s.

“It’s been quiet lately,” Ran says. “Guess it worked.”

“Good,” Yukina says, cutting out a bite of cake. “Shame, though, that we have to date in secret for now.”

Raising her coffee cup to her lips, Ran looks out to the window. “At least no one’s watching, now that they think there’s not actually all that between us…”

“Ran?”

When she looks, Yukina has her fork, and the first bite of strawberry shortcake, hovering in front of Ran’s face.

“Say ‘ah.’”

“Yukina!” Ran says, putting her cup down. “What if someone sees?”

“No one’s watching, remember? Now try some. It’s fantastic.”

“Ugh…” But Ran is smiling. She takes a bite…

…Yukina’s judgement proves flawless as always.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The story ended up straying a little from the original concept of these last few chapters so a lot of the ending was, for lack of a better term, improvised, but I hope it still satisfies. I don't think "three-shots" will happen very frequently, but if you don't mind them (or possibly if you like them?), don't hesitate to mention it so I'll have a better idea what will be okay with you guys! Next update soon!


	5. Control [Delinquent/StuCo President AU]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yukina is reminded that, sometimes, it isn't enough to just get Ran to the council room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt from an anonymous user, with certain... specifications ;)) Pardon the wait, and I hope it satisfies!

Just the sight of her makes Yukina's temper flare.

Mitake Ran finally arrives at the door. Yukina scowls at her – the careless way her tie hangs from her collar, the way her blazer sits unevenly on her shoulders, her posture, lax but infuriatingly proud in its defiance to Yukina.

It's the eyes, of course, that are the worst. Slack, but piercing. Impossible to read.

At least the note is in her hand. Ran raises it up. "'Come to the student council room.' Stuck above the handle." She lets her hand fall to her side. "You locked the door to the roof just to see me?"

Yukina glares, takes a few documents, and walks to Ran. "After dealing with you for so long, I've come to understand that you won't ever listen to me unless I have something you want."

"Something I... want?"

"Look," Yukina says as she shows Ran the document. "Once this report is processed, you're only one incident away from expulsion. I will *not* have a student expelled for the first time in years under my term as student council president."

"Ah." Ran looks up and down the paper, but Yukina can't tell if she's absorbing anything. "Okay. But what are you gonna do?"

"Despite my goals, I'm not going to compromise my integrity, but I will make you stop this behavior," Yukina says. "I'll be assigning someone to–"

Ran takes the hand Yukina holds the report with, and pulls it to the side, slipping the paper onto the table in the same motion. "Forgetting your own rules, Minato?" she says, stepping closer until their faces are inches apart. "I don't listen unless you have something I want."

Those eyes again, the liars' eyes that Yukina gets lost in and make her heart race. She glares into them. "Mitake..."

Ran only holds Yukina by the jaw, nudging her face up. "I've listened once, haven't I?" she whispers, the beginnings of a smirk playing at her lips. "I'm going to take what you owe me for my good behavior. It'll be just like before, at the coffee shop."

 _'It wasn't the coffee shop, though,'_ Yukina thinks. _'It was behind it, just after having been saved from delinquents from other schools, and definitely not somewhere like here, the damn student council room. This can't pass.'_

But at heart, Yukina is a bit of a liar, herself.

She glowers at Ran, one more time, before she says, "...Fine."

"I knew you just wanted to see me," Ran scoffs. And before Yukina can talk back, Ran takes her lips in a fast, forceful kiss. Just like before, Yukina simply melts.

It's infuriating how _attracted_ she is to an uncouth brute like her, how their relationship came to this somehow, where Yukina tries to keep Ran under control and Ran just slips through the cracks. Ran is so much and too often like a wildfire, where fighting her sometimes only serves to rouse her into fighting back stronger.

Control is only ever something Ran takes for herself.

And a part of Yukina, one that only Ran ever brings out, doesn’t mind relinquishing it to her.

Ran is as passionate and hungry as Yukina remembers, and she can feel an arm snake up her back and hold the back of her head, fingers digging into her hair, so that Ran can deepen the kiss. She gives Yukina a kind of attention that engulfs her senses in just  _her,_  from the little bites of her lip to the tongue meeting hers to how she makes Yukina’s breath feel stolen instead every quick instant she lets them part to catch it. Before long Yukina's arms are looped over Ran's shoulders, around her neck, and then as she feels arms wrap around her back she's laid down – gently? – onto the table.

The change is a bit of a wake-up call for Yukina, who just then realizes how loose her tie suddenly is, and how her blazer buttons have somehow come undone. She breaks away. "Mitake, you–"

"Sshh..." Ran's hush is soft, a rush of hot air on Yukina's sensitive earlobe. "I won't take my time."

"What are you talking about–"

And then Ran's lips are on Yukina's neck, trailing kisses from below her ear down to the base. It takes all of Yukina's strength to keep from making a sound, and when Ran bites into her skin, she can't help the breath that escapes her. Ran's hand explores Yukina's body, firm and warm through the fabric of her shirt as it glides over her side, her abdomen, between her breasts–

What's that metallic jingle.

Ran's hand withdraws from where it rested on her left breast, and she releases Yukina's neck before pushing herself up so that she hovers over her. The hand that isn't keeping her balance holds the rooftop keys tauntingly above Yukina's head.

"Got what I wanted," Ran says.

Yukina's mind says to sit up as Ran rises from her place, but other than her hand moving to her emptied blazer pocket, her body is still weak and she's still too short of breath to quite catch Ran's wrist before she turns.

She grunts as she sees Ran about to grab the doorknob, and says, "Wait."

Somehow, Ran does, her hand freezing just above it as she glances back expectantly at Yukina.

Yukina grits her teeth. _'More. Just say it. More.'_

The last of her pride is too thick to swallow. "Mitake," she says, "you win."

Ran's eyes, her liar's, thief's eyes, widen just a sliver when Yukina says that, almost enough for Yukina to be sure of the surprise in them. "Oh yeah?" she says. Though she tries to sound nonchalant, there's still a telltale trace of huskiness to her voice that gives her away. "I kind of figured, really."

"Don't let it go to your head," Yukina says, though not quite with the bite she hoped for. "Your presence in this school hangs by my decisions."

Ran looks away, and shrugs. "Whatever. Not my choice what you do."

Without another word, Ran leaves, and Yukina lets her. She touches the spot where Ran had bitten her. Still a little tender, definitely going to leave a mark (again), but at least her uniform hides it.

And then she glances at the report next to her, and curses.

Filing it won't feel quite as satisfying anymore.


	6. Star [Revue Starlight AU]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone has to reach Yukina.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a note about this AU: I don't plan to do cross-series AUs very much since I'd like for the content here to be understood by everyone, regardless of their fandom history, but I'm willing to make an exception for Revue Starlight since the overlap is so significant ^_^ Also, a side of SayoTsugu!
> 
> I'd also like to apologize again for the gap between updates. I got sick suddenly between these two, and even after getting better I still had some real-life work to catch up on, as you do, so I wasn't able to quite get this chapter done like I usually do. My goal is to stick to a regular, hopefully weekly update schedule, but if you guys are willing to wait a little extra between updates for me to polish them sometimes, I'd be very grateful!

A clash of steel. Pillars of blue stand tall and daunting. Chains snake and hang around them, cold and unforgiving as ice. Yukina's shadow stretches long in front of her, cast by the only light in this dark, empty stage. Her fortress.

A jacket falls, and a blade pierces the ground.

_Position zero._

The curtains fall, an all-consuming cascade of flowing velvet.

The last it envelops is brilliant red.

The last Yukina hears is a cry of burning anguish.

* * *

There's a bit of a status quo in the class when it comes to pair practice and Yukina. An unspoken rift exists between her and the other students – one born of an undeniable difference in skill. As it stood for the longest time, the only person who'd ever been able to cross that rift and shine with nearly as much brilliance as Yukina was Yukina's own chosen partner, Hikawa Sayo.

But even Sayo, for all her skill and endless toiling to reach the pinnacles that Yukina stood atop alone, could never shine with quite the same light. Beyond the rift of skill was a final barrier around the perfect actress Yukina's heart that no one had ever been able to breach.

Today, that changes.

"Pair up," the instructor says.

Yukina reaches for Sayo's hand as she always does, only for it to be taken by another.

Murmurs of surprise erupt around them as Mitake Ran disturbs the routine.

"Minato-san," she says, "and Hikawa-san. May I?"

Sayo is clearly taken aback, as it takes her a moment and a few stutters to find her words. "What— Then who do you expect me to—"

"Me!" says a smaller girl with short brown hair as she comes up to them. "We can switch partners for today, Sayo-san!"

Ran looks in shock at Tsugumi and the murmuring that now surrounds her. "Tsugumi?"

Tsugumi offers her a cheerful thumbs-up. "You can do it, Ran-chan!"

"Can you all stop wasting time?" Yukina says. "It shouldn't matter who our partners are in the end. Sayo, you can manage."

"Of course, Minato-san." Sayo offers Tsugumi her hand, and they walk off to find their space.

"That said," Yukina mutters, just loud enough for Ran to hear. "Mitake-san, what are you after?"

They both have last night's revue in mind, without a doubt. Yukina remembers Ran vividly, slashing at her with a fury that grew and grew as the song went on. No matter how much Yukina watched, she couldn't see what fueled those fires – why Ran chased after her, battle by battle, as hard as she did. She wonders what Ran sees.

"Nothing," Ran says. "I just want to dance with you."

Liar.

"Then I oblige," Yukina says, placing her hand in Ran's open one. They know their roles well enough, where Yukina holds Ran's shoulder as Ran holds her waist, and they glide in step, Yukina swinging on the outside, spinning back into Ran's arms. It's only each other that they don't quite understand.

Ran lacks the gentle finesse that Sayo had, swinging Yukina wider arcs than usual, spinning her farther from her own body than comfortable. At a point, she pulls Yukina back from a turn so abruptly that Yukina collides against her.

"What are you doing?" Yukina says as she pushes herself off of Ran. They try to get back in position.

"You're– distracting."

" _I'm_ distracting?" Yukina says. "When you're the one tossing me around like a doll?"

Ran scowls. "So you don't like when it's done to you." Yukina clicks her tongue.

They turn, and Ran feels tamer.

"I'm sure you already know, but these are partner dances," Yukina says. "They say the role of the masculine partner – your role – is to lead me, the feminine, but anyone half-familiar with the dance knows–" Step, spin, catch, "that the real lead is me."

Ran's stare falls to the floor, one eye narrowed as if in distaste. "That sounds like something you would say."

"What do you mean?" Turn, walk.

"You think I haven't noticed?" Ran says, swinging Yukina again with that same recklessness. "You treat everyone else like props to you, just because you're more skilled than them."

"That isn't how it is," Yukina says. "There can only be one Top Star. She leads the play."

That's when Ran dips Yukina, lower, lower than she's ever been, feeling almost all her weight rest solely on Ran's arm. At such a prone position, Ran's voice sounds so much closer.

"You look like you're acting alone."

* * *

Ran hates that light.

She knows how stars shine. She's watched countless sunsets, gazed into hundreds of night skies, hell, she's seen _Kasumi_ onstage. She knows in her heart how the brightest stars radiate a light that breathes life into everything it touches. She knows how stars are guides into worlds.

The light Yukina has is brilliant... but lifeless. A star in the night that shines alone.

Worst of all, it's blinding. Starlight isn't meant to drown out the light from other stars.

Ran resolved then, in the revues, to take that light for herself.

She resolved.

She fights. She fights, and fights, and fights until she doesn't flinch when a blade glides near her neck and until her sword moves like she's had it all her life.

And for all her fighting, she has nothing to show but the flames in her heart getting fanned and rising higher and higher, burning until it almost hurts just to _want_.

Another battle today, and the pin of her jacket is sliced off.

Yukina's silhouette is sharp against the lights. As the tip of her sword pierces the ground, and as she utters those two infernal words, something in Ran that had long been straining finally snaps.

The greed becomes too much to bear.

She screams into the dark.

* * *

"Mitake-san wants to defeat Minato-san?"

Tsugumi smiles shyly as she keeps in step with Sayo. "I wouldn't put it like that, but pretty much," she says. "Ran-chan admires a lot of things about Yukina-san, really, but she hates that one part of her."

"What one part?"

"Well, I can't explain it like Ran-chan does, but," Tsugumi has to pause for a turn, "doesn't Yukina-san feel like she pushes people away?"

Sayo ponders that for a moment, if the distance she felt with Yukina really was something built by her own hand.

When was the last time she felt like their characters had truly spoken through them? Through her?

* * *

The Revue of Desire begins, and Yukina stands before her throne once more.

Every battle was a story that had lead to the same end, over and over again. The light above her throne shouldered the burden alone to drown the whole stage in deep, icy blue.

But now the light is a scarlet like burning blood, and the light comes from all around like a fire had surrounded her. There is an intruder in her fortress.

Ran ascends the steps, and the firelight roars when they meet eyes, where Yukina finds the kind of glow of steel in the forge – a blade being shaped into a fatal sharpness, where once before all she could see were the smolders in the furnace.

When they cross blades, Yukina finds Ran's attacks almost too difficult to parry. Another swing, and they enter a deadlock.

"Mitake-san," Yukina says, finding a strange foreign emotion, like a storm stirring, as if Ran calls out to it. "There will never be anyone else who could ever seek Top Star as much as me. As long as this holds true, I cannot lose."

Ran pushes harder, forcing Yukina to step back. "You probably do want to be Top Star more than anyone else," she says, voice straining with effort, "but more than you want Top Star–"

Yukina finally breaks their standstill, and they break apart as they both prepare–

"–I want _you!_ "

A pin falls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Expect the next chapter sooner than this time, and to add to my usual prompt openings, I'm also willing to come back to old scenarios that I've already done before if you'd like to see more of them (sequel chapters, you could say), so if there was anything I'd already done that you'd like to see more of, you can say so! Thank you for reading!


	7. Fall [Angel/Devil AU]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ran finds an angel where angels shouldn't be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for waiting! Here's another prompt from a commenter, BeruKhansa! Please pardon if this chapter seems a little unpolished;; I'm still learning how to strike a good balance between not rushing and not dragging things too long.
> 
> Also, thank you so much for 100+ kudos! I'm so grateful that this little series for a rarepair like YukiRan has been able to make it even there :') Even if another hundred is far off, I'll do my best to continue!

Lately, Ran has been noticing a strange woman at the train stops of Shinjuku. Her hair is a striking lavender, smooth as silk, and the way the light bounces off her head wraps her in an ethereal glow. The nights are dark despite the city bustle, but this stranger rivals the moon.

Often, when the passengers have gone into the cars and ridden away, it was just the two of them, standing at the stops and waiting. They didn’t meet eyes often – just enough for Ran to wonder if she haunted her the same way.

Night after night they would catch each other, until one where coincidence places them side by side.

Ran takes initiative. “Excuse me,” she says softly. “I don’t mean to pry, but I see you really late at night at the same stops I go to, sometimes, and I never see you get on the trains. Do you live somewhere out of the way? It’s dangerous at night.”

The woman’s eyes are gold like the sun, and widen with surprise at what Ran asks. “You’re concerned about me?”

“Um, yes,” Ran says. She feels her ears warming up. “I see you all the time, and you’re always by yourself, so…”

Though Ran trails off, the woman nods. “What’s your name?”

“Huh? I’m… Mitake Ran. And you?”

“Minato Yukina,” she says, and then looks deeply into Ran’s eyes, as if trying to pry her mind open with just her stare. “Mitake-san… are you human?”

Ran freezes, and her eyes flick back up to the top of Yukina’s head before she can think to stop herself. Too late, and Yukina catches her.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “That must have been a strange question. Mitake-san, we shouldn’t speak again.”

Yukina does a quick, perfunctory bow of farewell before hurriedly walking away, into the night. The tips of Ran’s fingers tingle strangely, and her breath in her chest feels like ice.

As she watches Yukina’s back, she sees the light above her head for what it is.

* * *

Angels were beautiful in an unspeakable, otherworldly way detached from mankind but watching over them from their home on high. Surrounded by holy light, just the sight of them brought pain to devil eyes, while in their service to Heaven they were forbidden from making contact with humans, who they could only watch and protect, and devils, whose touch felt to them like the fire that burned in the depths of the inferno.

Ran is not an angel. Her kind works in the thick of humanity, sowing seeds of rebellion and desire into the vulnerable hearts. Devil’s work, and menial at that, but she can’t give what she doesn’t have. Lately, in Ran’s heart, rebellion and desire are plentiful – it’s just with irony that her heart is so because of an angel.

Yukina, the angel who didn’t blind her. _We shouldn’t speak again,_ she said. But her eyes radiated with too compelling a depth and beauty for Ran to just forget. The memory of her was the sun – dictating the order of every waking minute of Ran’s life.

She would find her again. Whether Ran found her straying again from Heaven or whether she’d be found herself.

And she doesn’t quite know which is which when she finds the angel again in a garden by the park, but she takes what she’s been given.

It’s nothing so absolute to a being that can vanish from Earth at will, but as Yukina walks past a thick tree, Ran advances and shoves an arm against the bark, trapping the stray angel between herself and the thick, aged trunk.

“Remember me?” she says. She looks into Yukina’s eyes again, finding that its light looks more like fire now than the pools of gold they were at first.

“The devil at the trains,” Yukina says coldly. “Didn’t I say we shouldn’t speak?”

“As an angel, you should know better than anyone that devils don’t just listen.”

Yukina’s eyebrows furrow at her, and it’s then that Ran notices how easy she is to actually look at, and how greedy heaven must be to to hide this beauty for themselves.

“What are you doing here?” she asks before her eyes are caught running down smooth, milky skin. “Not even Guardians come down to Earth anymore. Any why is your light so weak that I can look at you without feeling any pain?”

Yukina says nothing, and unless Ran is imagining it, she seems to shrink into herself, just slightly. “I'm under no obligation to tell you.”

“I’m doing you a favor, angel. If the other circles find out about a stray like you, they’ll jump at the change to pay back what you’ve been giving us for centuries and hunt you down. Take it from me, you wouldn’t like that.” But it’s a bluff, of course. There’s little Ran would be able to do in the first place.

“How would you know that Heaven wouldn’t retaliate? If I’m hurt, what guarantee do you have that they won’t strike you down in my name?”

“What should I care when they already hunt us unprompted?” Ran pulls at the collar of her own shirt, straining the hems to show Yukina the beginnings of a wide, jagged scar on her chest. “I’ve had a few thousand years to learn how to get around you.”

Yukina’s face warps into something bitter – it might be disgust, it might be regret, or both; Ran can’t read her. As if absent, Yukina’s hand hovers up slowly to toward the scar, but Ran grabs her wrist, carefully where the sleeves still cover, and stops her.

“What are you doing?” Ran says. “That’s just going to hurt you, you know. When angels touch devils, they burn.”

“But devils shouldn’t be able to look at angels,” Yukina says, with a voice like silk and the break of waves on the shore, all at once, “and yet, here we are. A devil, looking an angel in the eye, and an angel…” Her hand moves again, slowly, slowly…

“...Touching the devil’s scars.”

Ran’s skin is numb over the thick tissue where Yukina feels, but there are moments where her fingers brush over unharmed skin. She isn’t the angel, but Yukina’s touch is electric.

“What _are_ you?” Ran mutters.

Yukina hardly looks up at her. “You’ve been told the story of Eden? The first act of rebellion against the Heavens happened in a garden just like this. Adam and Eve were exiled after a serpent tempted them into eating the forbidden fruit.”

“I know the story,” Ran says. “But what does that have to do with all this?”

“You asked me why I was here, and why my light was so dim. What I was,” Yukina says. “I was tempted, just like Eve, by you. Long ago, when I first saw you on Earth.” Her hand is moving again, now to Ran’s face, where it caresses the curve of her cheek and the sharp line of her jaw. “But I can’t tell if you’re my serpent, or my fruit.”

The world around them feels like it disappears, and though Ran is aware of the power Yukina has over her, she doesn’t fight it when Yukina pulls her close.

She kisses back, not knowing why her heart races.


	8. Fall 2 [Angel/Devil AU]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a lot to learn about the beings you were never meant to meet (and more yet what they will tell you about yourself).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Partial nudity warning for this chapter!

Yukina didn't used to give devils a second thought. Centuries of experience and the command of dozens under her rank had cut it clearly for her — devils were blights to humankind, and should be killed. By now, the ages had whittled the number of devils meddling with humanity down to just a pitiful, scuttling few. Heaven hardly saw them anymore, and when they did, it wouldn't be long before the pest was hunted down and eliminated.

Yukina used to think nothing of the devils' blood that she spilled in Heaven's name. If anything, she was proud.

And then she saw Ran, and met her, and touched the scar left by a wound that nearly killed her.

"I have more," Ran says, when she catches Yukina staring at a long gash running down her tricep. "But you don't need to see them."

Yukina's words are slow to come. "I won't ask."

But she is curious. Devils live nothing like angels, existing as if part of humanity themselves, and adopting their ways. It's been five days since they met in the garden, and Ran has showed her humankind up close. Yukina's still not used to the sounds of cars rushing by, of loud radio and static interference, of the hours between midnight and sunrise that isolated their time off from the rest of the day (Ran said that midnight _was_ when devils were strongest).

She's not used to any of it, but she's not afraid of it, either. Just as she isn't afraid of Ran.

The devil turns around and sits across from Yukina on the small table of her apartment, setting down two cups of steaming black liquid on the table. Rich, earthy scents that Yukina can't name waft from them.

"I thought it'd be time to introduce you to some of my friends' work," Ran says. "Wait for it to cool a little first, but this is coffee. A drug, technically."

"A drug," Yukina repeats. "And people drink this... every day."

"Some people live by it," Ran says, shrugging. "And socialize over it. Wouldn't expect that about something you sticklers would call a 'vice,' would you?"

"Humans are complicated, as short-lived as they are," Yukina says. "I know better than to have expectations. They made something interesting of sex, too, haven't they?"

Ran coughs. "Uhm, yeah, I guess you could say that. Ahem. Weird comparison. Do you think about this a lot? What humans do?"

"I'd say just enough for someone who basically has them for a job," Yukina says. "You know what we do. Try to protect them from vices, despair, sin, pain, etcetera. I've always been told that you all were the ones who led them to ruin, but you actually... make coffee?"

"Well, no, that's just one thing we helped with," Ran says. "You know Prometheus? Stole fire from heaven and gave it to humans?" She holds her hand out an conjures a flame the size of her palm. "We do that. We're the ones that nudge them to try out things they wouldn't do if they just blindly obeyed and stayed away from danger. Sometimes it doesn't go too well, but sometimes... They're brilliant. Worth the risk of getting our livers eaten by eagles."

"Brilliant... I suppose they can be." Yukina stays quiet, content with sitting in the profundity of Ran's words, and takes a first sip of her coffee.

…It's not very good.

"This isn't one of those times," she says, frowning. "Terrible taste. They drink this every day?"

"Oh, you don't like it black, huh?" Ran gets up and goes to the counter.

"Black? As opposed to white?"

"As opposed to everything else." She puts down a box of milk, a spoon, and a sugar dispenser, then takes Yukina's cup, and starts adding them to the to the bitter beverage. "I have a friend who hates it black, too. For your first try, I'll make it the way she does, and you can change it the way you like next time." She stirs it, and then slides it back. "Here you go."

Yukina takes the cup gingerly, noticing the decidedly sweeter aroma drifting from it and the lighter color, and then takes a sip.

"…Much better.”

Ran smiles and laughs softly. "You angels and your milk-and-honey lifestyles."

Yukina shrugs, and lets the remark fly. She finds no issue with not having an answer to that.

They sip their coffee in silence, watching the light of the sunrise fall into the room and listening to the first songs of the birds in the morning. The tranquility is more familiar to Yukina than anything else, and oddly, she finds Ran in place within it, as if she belongs in this place that feels so much like her old home despite being so far from it.

Under and alongside all the kindness she'd extended to Yukina, Ran is still a devil. From the fire in her grins to the rough, impetuous way she moves to the little glimpses of cold, dark, unspoken _something_ in her eyes that Yukina had caught a few times at night when the only sound in the room was the breeze in the curtains. She is defiance and freedom and challenge and quiet, quiet pain, somewhere locked up under all the coarseness in her attitude.

For all the world she'd shown Yukina, there was so little she felt like she knew of Ran, herself. That they knew of each other. Five days was not a long time by any means, especially for those with the lifetimes of stars, but Yukina is impatient now, to know the person that tore her heart from Heaven, and how Heaven had hurt them both.

"Ran," she says, trying to pull her gaze to meet her own. Ran's eyes are warm, then. "Tonight, will you show me?"

Another moment of vulnerability, just a flash of it in Ran's face, before she breathes in and nods.

* * *

That night, Ran's touch is tender, more so than Yukina ever could've imagined from a being whose skin was supposed to burn. As she loves Yukina, lips on her skin and fingers locked in hers, there comes a point where Ran can't seem to help but call her beautiful, as if she could vanish at any moment and all of this would just disappear like a dream.

But it's not a dream — it's real, and as their passion reaches a fervent peak, where thought disappears and sensation envelops everything, it goes on. And finishes. And ends, as if it had all the mundanity that Yukina had yet to experience.

One kiss, like to close it, and Ran lets herself fall to Yukina's side with a tired thump, pulling the sheets on top of them. She gives Yukina a nervous smile as they catch their breath.

"Did— Did you like that?" she says, voice heavy and uneven as her breathing.

"You were good," Yukina manages through all the hundreds of words rushing to mind. "Yes, I did. Thank you. So this is what humans made of your gifts, huh?"

Ran smiles — it's wide and bright and lights her eyes through the early weariness weighing them down, when Yukina notices they're different. Black where there was once white.

"Wait, Ran," Yukina says. "Are you okay? Your sclera — it's turning black..."

The eyes widen, then shut as Ran turns away. "Sorry, I— I must have gotten careless. You weren't supposed to see that. Don't worry about it."

Now that Ran's back is turned to her (and she's not distracted), Yukina can look at the scars covering her torso, and feels her heart sink when she begins to recognize what instruments must have formed them. The warped skin running in a thick line from her shoulder to the center of her back is from the slash of the flaming swords of archangels. That scar is muddled even more by a series of cuts and uneven patches all across her trapezius from what must be a scourge. At the small of Ran's back is a cut-sized section of thick, raised skin, and if Yukina thinks about it, she might have seen a similar one on Ran's abdomen, across from this...

Yukina doesn't want to consider the devils she'd run a sword through herself. She wills her mind to race away from that thought to why? Why would any devil offer her the kindness that Ran did, after all their kind had done to them?

In her trance Yukina grazes a finger along the old cuts on Ran's back, and Ran flinches at the contact, straightening up and rising from the bed.

"I— I'm sorry," Yukina says, propped up on her elbow. "I didn't mean to— Is it still tender?"

Ran is jumpy when she answers, and though she turns her head towards Yukina, they don't meet eyes. "N-No it's okay, I overreacted a little," she says. "There are still some… memories, I guess, in them, but this is part of what you wanted to see, and I said yes, so..."

"You don't have to if you're not ready," Yukina says.

"No, I am! Yukina, of course I am, for fuck's sake didn't we just— agh..." Ran rubs her neck and shakes her head. "Don't— Don't worry about it. It's the past. They've just... never been touched like that before."

"…Did it hurt?"

"They pretend to, sometimes. I fell for it just now but I know it's all in my head."

Yukina presses her lips in a line, thinking of what to say. She doesn't like how she's cornered Ran like this, after what of her past she's seen etched into her skin.

She thinks about her own wings, and the burning she'd felt on them when her heart first gave in.

"Ran," she says with a nervous rasp. "If you'll still show me, I still want to see you. All of you. So I'll know who it was that shone brighter than the light of the Almighty, and what is it that devils are. I want to know the mistakes I made — right from wrong."

When the words are said and Ran turns to look her in the eye again, the black is still there — and the coldness Yukina doesn't know. "You know, it never really was my responsibility to teach you. I owe you angels nothing."

Yukina holds her breath.

"But if I was what made you fall... I want to know what that means, too. If it was me or — or what you _thought_ I was."

Ran turns around again, her gaze anchored to the bed. Yukina reaches, hesitantly, for her hand, and holds it. "We'll learn together."

Ran nods. "But now that you've seen my back, all that's left is..."

It takes only the time to breathe in, and out, for Ran to complete the transformation.

Devils had always been monsters. Crooked black horns erupt from Ran's head, and vast, leathery wings of dark scale and membrane with cuts and holes and stitches stretch from her back across the width of the room. A serpentine tail peeks out from the silhouette of her back, and her hands that have loosened around Yukina's feel like they've given way to inhuman claws, covered in ashen scales much like parts of Ran's own face.

And Yukina sees the black expanse of the night sky in Ran's eyes, and the glow of the stars in the gold flecks of her snakelike iris. There’s deep pain, and fear, and strength and kindness despite. It's so easy to accept now that devils aren't monsters. Ran isn't a monster.

(Yukina wishes it was the same for the truth that stares her in the eye now, that tells her she’s a murderer with a thousand years of spilled blood to answer for.)

Words don't have a place between them right now, so Yukina places a kiss on Ran's lips.

It's chaste, and little more than a soft press of skin, but she prolongs it so that when they part, Ran can see all at once her shattered halo and the skin, bone and scorched feathers that remain of her wings.

Ran's mouth opens, but the words find Yukina first.

"You _are_ beautiful."


	9. Fall 3 [Angel/Devil AU]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The greater the penalty, the harder it becomes to elude; and there's a steep price for making enemies of Heaven and Hell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry again for the long wait for this one! (But in my defense this one is 3000 words long so...) To compensate I plan on putting out the next chapters quicker, since I was able to write them at the same time as this, hehe.
> 
> Edit 21/07/19: Added one additional scene.

The path seems to snake on through the mountainside forever. Ran exhales sharply, adjusting her tired grip on her motorcycle handlebars and rounding another turn. Almost there. They were almost there.

The arms around her waist shift, along with the weight on her back.

"Ran," Yukina says, raising her voice just above the rumble of the engine and through their helmets, "can we stop for a moment? We've been riding for three hours and— and it's freezing."

A pang of worry shoots through Ran's stomach. The night had invigorated Ran well enough throughout their escape, but in the thick of everything that had been happening, it slipped her mind how much someone like Yukina would have been worn down without it. And knowing Yukina, she wouldn't have said anything until she nearly couldn't bear it.

Ran carefully shifts a hand to one of the arms around her waist and holds it. "Can you handle a few more minutes? We'll be at a gas stop soon. I'll be able to get you something there."

Yukina's answer is little more than a murmur that Ran can only feel through her chest, and then she settles back into her position lying against Ran. It's answer enough, though, and Ran picks her speed up a little before she has to worry about Yukina falling over.

Truth be told, it hadn't been that long since that night — it still sent ghosts of pain through Ran whenever her back would hit anything solid, or worse, human. But Yukina's weight against her then as they rode into the night was the one exception that made her feel safe, like the old wounds were never there. It's one thing for her to want to keep that sense of comfort there, but it's another, more important feeling, for her to want Yukina not to come to any harm.

She keeps going, into the dark and past the mountain trail until at last the electric lights of a gas station are in sight. Ran quickly but carefully steers the bike near one of the pumps, and takes her helmet off.

"Yukina, we're here," she says. She can't quite turn to see, but she hears Yukina shift and take her own helmet off, then feels the shift of weight as she steps off the bike. Ran follows suit.

All things considered, Yukina doesn't look as bad as Ran worried she would be feeling. The low ponytail saved her hair from the worst of the helmet's tousling, and other than the tired weight to her eyes, she seems fine, if pale.

Based on the look she shoots Ran, though, the same can't be said of her.

"Your hair is a mess," Yukina says.

"Whatever," Ran says. "How's the cut?"

Yukina twists her leg around to look at the back of her calf, where a red-stained bandage wraps around the thick of it, below the knee. "It's not getting worse. That's good enough." She stands straight again and looks at Ran. "And your back? I was rather conscious of it the whole time."

Ran's eyebrows rise. "My back...? It's... it's fine. You're fine. Don't worry."

Despite her words, though, Yukina still frowns in her concern. Ran sighs.

"Okay, maybe some of it is itching a little. Is that what you wanted to hear?"

"I'm not sure," Yukina says. "I was worried that such a close encounter with holy fire might... _trigger_ something, I suppose. My own wounds aren't healing like they used to, as you can see. It could be worse for a devil."

The air grows heavy. It strikes Ran again how well the road distracted her from everything. "I think... they might be worse. But I really don't feel anything there, no phantom pains or anything." A strange thought arises, and she does her best not to start squirming in embarrassment. "I think it might be... _because_ of you, that I feel okay, you know? Like, my scars trust you, or something..."

Yukina doesn't say anything, and Ran can't see her expression because she's too focused on focusing on just anything else. Like the ground, or the gas prices posted over there, or the vending machines in the corner, past the wall...

"You said you were cold, right?" She pats Yukina's arm and starts moving. "I'll get you something."

It's a short jog and a few button presses for Ran to hear the mechanical clunk of the hot coffee can falling into the slot, and as she picks it up, she jumps at a voice calling to her. 

"Hey, Mitake!"

It's a gruff voice, one that Ran hadn't heard in years. Warily, she looks to the side where two other devils approach. Their smiles are warm, but Ran makes no assumptions on what they know about her or Yukina. She doesn't know how quickly news travels.

"Hiroyuki-san," she says to the man, trying her best to sound calm. "It's been a long time. What are you doing here?"

"Same as you, probably," Hiroyuki says. "Devil work."

"That's broad. Anything more specific?"

Hiroyuki shrugs. "Hey, most of our job is spectating, anyway. And speaking of spectating..." He nudges his head subtly in the general direction of the gas pumps. "She's an angel, isn't she?"

Ran bristles. He has to have ideas. "What of it?"

"She's _fallen,_ Mitake," Hiroyuki says in a conspiratorial whisper. "Fallen angels are a huge, _huge_ deal for devils at the bottom ranks like us, right? Congrats on the catch, turning them in is a big time promotion, but you're buying her... coffee?"

"What, you don't think coffee is weird too, do you? Hasn't it occurred to you that I might like coffee for myself?"

"Hey, I already know you like coffee! _Black!_ " Hiroyuki points at the can. "That thing is white mocha! White _and_ mocha!" 

"Maybe I'm trying something new?" 

"Bullshit."

"Ugh, you're terrible. Look, fallen angels are still angels, okay?" Ran bluffs. "If I can avoid a fight while getting her to the boss, a coffee is no problem."

"You're worried about a fallen angel at midnight?" Hiroyuki says, raising a doubtful eyebrow. "You, a devil?"

"I'm building trust here," Ran snaps. "If she decides I'm bad news during the day, I won't have anything to back that confidence up. Now piss off about her."

"Now, Mitake, I want a deal—"

"She's _mine,_ you bastard." The words leave an odd taste in Ran's mouth, but Ran can't mull over it before Hiroyuki’s taller friend steps forward angrily.

Hiroyuki holds out an arm to stop him. "Mizotani, it's alright. She said it, the kill is hers." Mizotani backs off, and Hiroyuki sighs. "I got it, Mitake. I'll stay away. But if she turns out to be a fighter, just let me know."

Ran glares. "Just get out of here, Hiroyuki."

Scowling, Hiroyuki ushers his cohort away and leaves Ran to her devices. When he's far enough, she lets out a heavy breath and turns around.

Only for her back to erupt in a searing pain as she's shoved against a wall.

"So I'm good to turn in, is it?" Yukina's eyes are blazing in a furious, blinding white, but her voice is like ice. "You only took me in to hand me over to Hell? You know, I never thought I'd be called 'yours,' in a context like this."

"Yukina— Yukina, put me down! Listen!"

"Why should I? Bad things happen when people listen to _snakes_ like you." A sword appears in Yukina's hand, its blade aflame in the same white as her eyes. The fire doesn't even touch Ran, but it hurts. "If even angels are after me now, what's stopping you?"

Ran lets go of the can and lets it clang to the ground as she tries to pull Yukina's arm away, but whether it's her fury behind her strength or just _her_ , she doesn't move. The sword rises. Ran's heart pounds in her chest.

"Yukina!" she says. "I'm not going to give you to them! I was lying to protect you!" Yukina's fire doesn't weaken. Ran's vision is blurring. She can't think. "I love you!"

A moment passes where it's all Ran can manage just to stay conscious, but she hears the roar of the fires soften, and the harsh light begins to dim. When she tries to look, Yukina has conflict all over her face, but then lets Ran go.

Ran tumbles to her knees, still in shock. "Yukina," she says, dazed, "you dumbass, of course I..."

Then Yukina joins her on the ground, all her harsh shine gone, and wraps her arms around Ran. "I'm so sorry," she says. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over me. I just came here because you were taking long and I was worried that an angel found you, and then I heard _that_..."

"It's okay," Ran says. "Today's been tough. You were scared, and you weren't wrong to be. But... you can trust me." She embraces Yukina, and leans on her. "I won't let anything happen to you."

Yukina lets go of Ran so she can see her face, and Ran sees so much vulnerability in Yukina just then that her heart aches. "You don't deserve struggles like what I put you through. You deserve better than me."

"I don't think someone as stupid as me deserves you, either," Ran says. "But I don't want anyone else. That's why you can trust me."

Despite the grief, Yukina manages a smirk. "Because you're selfish?"

Ran smiles. "Yeah."

Yukina settles down, her gaze falling to the ground in a warm calm, and she sighs. "Thank you. Thank you, Ran."

"Don't worry about it," Ran says. "I mean, it is my fault you're here, right?"

When Yukina gives her a smile back, Ran returns it, then picks up the can and stands to her feet. "Let's keep going, then. Just a few more hours and we'll make it there."

"A new home," Yukina says, getting up. "As... people."

Ran nods. "We can pass as them, don't worry. Now come on. The longer we stay here the more likely those angels will find us."

* * *

It's in a rush of fire, pain and adrenaline, though, that they _are_ found. But it isn't by angels.

"Come _on_ , Mitake," Hiroyuki's voice rumbles. With his grip on Ran's neck, he drags her across the rough stone and dirt, sending needles and aches and old burns shooting through her skin. "I thought you knew better than to actually fall in love with an angel."

Ran's wings beat dust into the air from where she's pinned on the ground, and she snarls at Hiroyuki, breathing a fire at him that he just waves away with his own scaled hand.

"Have it your way, you fucking idiot," he says. "We get double the rewards in the end. Hah!"

With hardly a grunt, he pulls Ran up and tosses her away to where Mizotani holds Yukina by her own neck.

The pain all throughout Ran's body makes her vision hazy already, but Yukina is ablaze with anger. She's fighting, and even in the dead of night her fire is like the sun, but in Mizotani’s grip and with all the wounds and exhaustion her body has suffered, Ran fears that Yukina — that the both of them, are on their last legs.

Ran can hardly move, but she wills her limbs to pull her toward Yukina in a desperate crawl. She reaches weakly for Yukina, only for a heavy leather boot to kick her hand away and shove itself down onto her spine. It's such a sudden pain that she cries out in a voice she hardly recognizes as her own.

"Is this your _girlfriend's_?" Hiroyuki says, swinging the tip of Yukina's flaming sword near Ran's face. As he continues, he digs the soles of his shoe down into her wounds. "I was hoping I wouldn't need to, but since you're being so stubborn right now, Mitake, I might have to run you through with it just to shut you up." He kicks Ran over so that Ran can see, even with her blurring vision and through the darkness creeping into the corners of her eyes, the sword being raised above her chest.

Her eyes shut.

There's a blast of wind, and a noise like a heavy thud.

And a pained cry in Yukina's voice that snaps her back into reality.

Yukina, pale and trembling, hovers above her with one arm's support, her face twisted in agony. Terror surges through Ran's blood and freezes like a biting ice as she looks down and sees the end of the blade itself impaled through Yukina's chest, the tip halted only inches from Ran's own by the bloody, iron grip of a single hand. When Ran tries to speak, her voice sounds to her like a ghost's. 

"Yukina...? Yukina? Hey, don't..."

All Yukina can do is meet Ran's eyes with her own, where a few tears are beginning to well up, as if dousing the light that was once burning in them. Ran's hands rise, but they don't know what to do. She can't think.

But then Hiroyuki speaks, and the fury that his voice enkindles in her begins to thaw at the fear in her veins. "Son of a bitch..." With a grunt, he tries to wrest the sword free, but Yukina's single, trembling hand proves stronger. Why?

Inexplicably, Yukina smiles. Her next words are shaky, almost whispers, but the weight she puts in them is painfully tangible. "Ran," she says as a crack forms on the blade in her hands, "thank you for... letting me... redeem myself."

With hardly a wince, Yukina shatters the blade in a burst of light, and then, falls limply against Ran.

Ran scrambles to get up so she can lay Yukina upright and look at her, struggling to keep the mounting panic at bay. There's so much red, everywhere, and Ran can hardly guide her eyes to where they need to check, to maybe, maybe save her and work some kind of miracle — but when she calls Yukina's name and turns her face to look at her, there's nothing. No movement. No breath.

Yet Ran's heart races, pumping grief and fear and now, a fury like molten steel, all throughout her body. The mixture brings a pain that draws tears into her eyes, but when she glares at Hiroyuki's confused form, the rage that swirls in them gives no way to sorrow.

She lays Yukina gently on the ground, and stands up, stretching her wings. A fire envelops her arms, burning from bright red to blinding white.

An angry roar climbs up her throat, and she looses it into the night as she charges at Hiroyuki.

* * *

Golden light fall in through a window at Yukina's side. She's groggy as she wakes up, thoughts and memories trickling in through a thick fog. She shifts, and a sharp pain shoots through her chest.

"Oho, Minato-san," comes a soft voice, "you've finally returned to us."

There's a girl with a messy bob of pale blonde hair sitting on a chair by the wall. She looks sleepy, which irritates Yukina, because it doesn't help the worry growing in her.

"What do you mean by 'returned?'" Yukina says. "Who are you? Where am I?"

The blonde's mouth forms a little bored "o" shape. "Why, Minato-san, you're in Heaven, of course!"

Yukina's heart nearly stops. "What? That's impossible..."

"What do you mean?" the blonde says. "That's where all good girls go when they die, isn't it? I'm God, by the way."

" _Die?_ Are you saying that I —"

The door flies open. "Moca, get up. Lisa-san says we need—" Ran stops her words cold, eyes transfixed on Yukina the same way Yukina's are on her. "Yukina?"

Yukina remembers. "Ran."

"Yukina!" Ran hurries to Yukina's side, pulling her into an embrace that hurts her wounds, but Yukina doesn't mind. "You’re really awake… You’re really — You scared me, damn it! Don't ev- ever pull something like that again, got it?"

"Ran, what's going on? That girl there says she's God and I'm — we're — in Heaven, and — are you crying?"

"She said _what?_ " The tears are streaming, and her face is pink. Without a doubt, Ran is crying. She turns around and unceremoniously smacks 'God' upside the head. "Moca, what the hell!"

"I was just messing around!" the girl, Moca, says. "To be fair, if you didn't interrupt I'd have gotten to the punchline and laid it all out there."

"I don't give a shit, don't you know what happened to us?"

"I mean, yeah, duh, we were the ones who got you out of there. Hey, Minato-san." Moca peeks out toward her from past Ran. "Did you know your girlfriend beat those two guys up and started a fire? And then she passed out for like a whole day, but the first part is cool, isn't it?"

It's utterly surreal, for Yukina to be plucked from a life-or-death situation only to be dropped into here, where this strange girl in a hoodie lets Ran shove and nudge her around as she said odd things like none of it ever mattered.

But it's a good reality, where she's alive, and Ran is herself, and they're free.

Yukina sighs. "That is quite impressive, Ran. I didn't know you had it in you."

Ran frowns and wipes at her face with her sleeve. "Not even awake for an hour and you're both already teasing me, huh?"

Yukina gives her a soft smile, then looks at Moca. "Pardon, um, Moca-san, can you give us a moment?"

"Ooh, I gotcha," Moca says with a wide grin. She walks to the door and sees herself out. "Ran, play nice with the patient."

"Shut up."

There's the click of the lock, and then they're alone.

"Ran. Come here."

She walks to Yukina's bed, and Yukina beckons her down with a hand on her shoulder. She's not sure what she expects from Ran — a kiss, more crying, or what — but what she gets is a gentle touch of their foreheads.

"To be honest," Ran says, her voice intimately low, "I don't remember anything from after I thought you were gone. It just hurt. A lot."

"I'm sorry," Yukina says. "I didn't know how else to save you."

"It's alright. I get it. You've started making up for your past. And..." Ran looks at Yukina then, as if Yukina was everything that ever mattered. "...you're still here."

Yukina takes Ran’s hand in hers. “We made it.”

* * *

.

.

.

There's a bright speck of orange in the distance — the only light in the night that ever stood out the whole two hour drive Lisa and Moca made along Ran's route. 

"Think that's them?" Moca says, leaning forward from her shotgun view.

"If it is," Lisa mutters grimly, "it can't be good." She glances quickly at Moca, her heart sinking when even her carefree blue eyes have been overcast with a grave darkness. She puts a foot to the gas, and drives quick to the site.

When they arrive, the ground is littered with fires, all growing in size toward a great central flame where four bodies lie on the ground. Moca practically jumps out of the car, stretching a pair of leathery wings out and putting out the flames with strong sweeps of quieting, wing-beaten wind. Close behind, Lisa treks onto the singed ground, toward the bodies.

"That's them," Lisa says. Yukina's silvery hair stands calls back long-buried memories of Heaven, when they still used to see each other, but there's a mounting fear overcoming the bittersweet nostalgia. She pushes the reminiscing back and turns to Moca. "Moca, come on!"

Moca's heavy footsteps trudge close, and as she makes it to Lisa's side, Lisa sees the second body, next to Yukina. A young woman, looking about her age, with short black hair. Lisa conjures a small light in her palm, and she finds the red streak Moca told her to look out for. This must be Ran unconscious next to her. Stains of black and dark red cover their skin, and especially Yukina's clothes.

"Whoa," Moca says. "They're not looking too good. Hey, Lisa, when they kicked you out of Heaven, did they take away your miraculous healing privileges? 'Cause Ran's been through worse and all, but your friend here..."

"I'll do what I can," Lisa says. 

"Hope it's enough." Moca looks somberly at Ran, then at the other two bodies splayed nearby, recognizing them as old enemies that she thought had left her alone long ago. "Geez, Ran, what trouble did you get into this time...?"

"You know them?" Lisa says, preparing to carry Yukina back to the car.

"Yeah." Moca shrugs. "These guys had some bones to pick with Ran. I think I have a good idea what happened here."

"Tell me on the way back. We have to get them treated as soon as we can."

As Lisa moves to carry Yukina to the car, something between her and Ran shifts on the ground. 

Scales still cover Ran's hand, but Yukina's grip on it tightens delicately in her sleep.


	10. Smear [Canon Compliant]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a hot day for festival preparation, and Ran is a mess... or so Yukina claims.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is based on [this pic](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/bandori/images/3/37/GARUPARTY%21_2019_GBP_Visual.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20190711015329) of the vocalists for the Garuparty in Ikebukuro 2019 event. You can picture them in those outfits, if you'd like!

"Here. Red lemonade."

The paint roller stops in its tracks, and Ran turns her head back to look at Yukina. "Is this on the house or are you trying to make a sale?"

"It's hot, and you're doing the most physical job out of all of us," Yukina says, still holding out the plastic cup. "So do you want it or not?"

Ran stifles a smile as she lays the roller stick down, then takes the cup and downs a few quick gulps, sighing in refreshment. Her cup already half empty, she takes a seat on the little folding chair she'd propped up near the cans of bright paint, and raises the cup at Yukina. "Thanks," she says, her voice airy with a slight weariness. "Didn't realize how much I needed that."

"Too focused on your work to notice how hard the sun is beating down on you?" Yukina says. "Get up again."

Ran scowls. "Huh?"

"Get up. You're a mess."

Ran does stand from her seat with a harshness that suggests challenge — well, what's new — but Yukina tries to ignore that as she deftly tugs off the towel hanging on Ran's shoulders. She doesn't know where to begin — the sweat collecting on her brow and her neck are nagging at Yukina's attention, but then there's also the paint carelessly smeared on her shirt and her skin and, good grief, even her face?

She wipes at the stain on Ran's cheek, wordlessly adjusting when Ran jolts back in surprise. Thank goodness the paint there doesn't seem to have dried completely.

"You probably want to run these through some water," Yukina says. "These kinds of paints stain when they're on skin, you know."

Noises of confusion aside, Ran is at a loss for words. A red that isn't paint this time spreads across her face, and Yukina pretends not to notice as she moves down to the stain on Ran's arm, just above her elbow.

She _is_ taken aback, though, when she finds Ran's arm firmer than she expected. Even through the towel and softness of skin she can feel a certain... form. A definition Yukina hadn't expected to find at all.

Yukina mumbles under her breath. "Is this why you rolled your sleeves up..."

"What was that?"

"Have you been doing this the whole day?" Decent save, changing the subject. "Just painting?"

Ran's eyebrows knit suspiciously. "Well, yeah, but uh, I haven't made that much progress since I spent a lot of time lugging the paint cans around, and the brushes, and the rollers... Why?"

Yukina shrugs, trying to appear casual as she gives the stain on Ran's arm a little 'extra' care. "Nothing, you just seem a little worked out."

"Worked out?"

" _Worn_ out," Yukina says firmly. "Pay attention."

"What — Uh. Sorry."

When Yukina glances, Ran's face is still flushed, which is good, because it must mean that her mind is too preoccupied to notice all the careless mistakes Yukina is making and, hopefully, any blushing on her own face.

Once she feels like she's rubbed the stain away, giving Ran's arm a good once-over to be sure, she dabs at the sweat on Ran's brow, then around her neck, and, very quickly, down the other arm to be sure. 

"There," she says, handing Ran her towel back. "Now you don't look like a careless slob."

Ran seems to growl at that. "Ah, that's what you were thinking."

"Try to wipe paint away as soon as possible next time," Yukina says. "By any chance, would you let me watch you paint for a moment before I go?"

"Why would you want to watch me paint?"

"Maybe you're so sloppy because you use the brushes and rollers wrong." Yukina shrugs. "Just a simple concern."

"Ah-ha, no, I'm okay, Master Paint Roller Minato-san," Ran says with a crooked, wry smile. "You should, uh, go along with _your_ job."

Yukina sighs. "Suit yourself." She turns, tossing her hair over her shoulder, but she doesn't _quite_ leave right away. As she walks a far enough distance and a long enough time, she throws a quick glance behind her to find Ran back at work with the roller stick, covering ten tall feet of wood in a bright yellow. And when she looks closely...

...she certainly wasn't just feeling things earlier.

* * *

When Ran looks around and sees no sign of Yukina, she hurriedly rolls the sleeves of her shirt back down and smooths them. She sighs, trying to push the heat spreading across her face to the back of her mind, and then, with a hand over her sleeve, just lightly, subtly, flexes her arm.

…That's not bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...painting isn't that strenuous but i think ran could be a little bit buff.


	11. Show [Future Fic]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A change in scenery makes Ran a little popular with some girls. Yukina doesn't take kindly to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got a prompt for a jealous Yukina and/or top Yukina, and I'm not sure if this fills any of those prompts but it was kind of inspired by them ^^;;

Yukina doesn't realize how stony her face must have seemed before until Lisa joins her by the railing of the deck.

"Hey," she says tenderly. "I know the view is fantastic and all, but you've been here for fifteen minutes."

Yukina is midway through breaking out of her trance when she glances at the view Lisa is talking about. The ocean at night, when the clouds and manmade lights cloud your vision of the stars faintly glowing overhead, really is nothing more than a black expanse. Fifteen minutes and Yukina hadn't noticed the vast nothing staring back at her.

She sighs. "Sorry. I'm just feeling a little out of place is all."

"Out of place? You know Kokoro rounded up the whole CiRCLE gang for Kaoru's birthday, right?"

"The CiRCLE gang," Yukina repeats, "and... a few dozen kittens."

Lisa does a sympathetic little laugh and shrugs. "Leave it to Kaoru to dedicate her birthday to everyone else." In the pause that follows, Lisa leans forward on the railing, in a perfect imitation of Yukina's pose. "Are you worried about the, uh, kittens?"

"Seta-san is attending to them perfectly, I trust," Yukina says. "My own people skills aren't yet quite up to par for this type of situation. I don't want to rely on you too much, but without you between me and the crowd, I can't find my place."

"Sure you can, Yukina!" Lisa says cheerfully. "Come on, it's you! You're gorgeous in that dress, and bold, and confident, and—"

"Standoffish, intimidating, cold..." A strong wind blows by, tossing the ocean chill over Yukina's exposed shoulders and making her hiss through her teeth. Despite herself, she smiles. "Cold. Definitely cold."

Lisa laughs, out loud this time, and honest. "Honey you've got this, don't worry."

Yukina shakes her head. "It's not like that, no. I haven't got this at all." She sees Lisa lean in attentively, and continues. "It's the kittens after all, maybe just a little. Have you seen Ran?"

"What? Yeah I've seen Ran, she's —  _ ohh... _ Oh, Yukina."

They both throw a look over their shoulders, scanning the crowd for the bright streak of fiery red. Yukina spots her first, standing next to Moca while they entertain about three young women Yukina doesn't recognize. She nudges Lisa, points, and waits for Lisa's eye to follow.

"Wow, okay, so, she does pull off a suit really well," Lisa says. "Moca, too, not bad..."

"Ran looks just as good in a dress," Yukina says. "She didn't have to do this."

"But she looks so much more confident in that outfit. Or, at least, as confident as she can be while talking to three girls she doesn't know. Much better than she was in high school, anyway.

Yukina stares in silence at Ran rubbing a bashful hand behind her neck as one of the girls hops at her excitedly. Moca waggles her eyebrows at her and elbows her arm playfully, to which Ran elbows back.

Lisa just goes for a simple tap on Yukina's shoulder. "I know your relationship is still supposed to be on the low, but you should go talk to her. That should help."

"There's nothing to discuss."

_ "Yu-ki-na," _ Lisa stresses each syllable. "What did we say about ignoring your feelings?"

"To... not."

"'Atta girl."

Yukina mulls over it for a moment, when in the distance, a girl getting a bit too close to Ran sparks just a strong enough spark of irritation for her to act on.

"Lisa," Yukina says, starting a stride toward the party. "I think I'll go act on my emotions now."

"Oh, you're gonna talk to her?" Lisa says as Yukina walks on. "That's good, affirming feelings is good! Wait, you are gonna talk to her, right? Yukina?"

* * *

"Ran, where are you going?"

Ran stops mid-stride and puts a hand on Moca's shoulder. The smile on her face is tired, but in front of Moca, Ran doesn't feel a need to mask it. "Just getting some time to myself for a while. I won't be long, don't worry."

"Oh, your socializing meter's on empty, huh?" Moca says with a sly smile.

"You know me," Ran sighs. "See you in ten."

Moca lazily waves Ran goodbye, and Ran walks off, into a small hall by the inside of the ship that the staff had cordoned off for CiRCLE regulars like her. Kokoro arranged for little lounge rooms to be prepared for each of the bands that arrived, and upon finding it Ran swiftly ducks into the room designated for Afterglow, heading straight to the couch and dropping her weight on it with a relieved groan.

As she loosens her tie around her neck and stares at the ceiling, she mutters tiredly to herself. "This is really different from those dinner parties..."

"How so?" 

Ran jolts upright, looking to the doors and finding Yukina leaning casually against the near wall.

"Y-Yukina! Hey, um, if you're looking for the Roselia room, it's—" 

"Just past, I know, but... I wanted to see you."

"Me?"

Yukina nods, and saunters over. Ran isn't sure if she's imagining the subtly wider sway of her hips than normal, but nonetheless she can't look away. Yukina's skin is flawless and practically glowing even in the dimly lit room they're in, and the night blue fabric of her gown flows sleek against her skin.

She's about to comment on her looks when Yukina presses a finger to Ran's lips and leans in close. Her voice is smooth and dark, making Ran's heartbeat pick up in ways she's sure Yukina knows of. "Would you lie down for me?"

"Lie down?"

Yukina's hand, gentle but firm on Ran's shoulder, pushes her so that her back lies along the length of the couch, and then she shifts to hover over Ran and straddle her hips. The fabric of her dress slides down her thigh from the slit on the side and gives Ran an eyeful of milky skin that she's too shy to take in.

"Uh, Yukina," Ran says as a deep blush goes over her features. "Do you need something?" Yukina doesn't say anything to her for a time after that, seeming unusually focused on running her hands over Ran's arms, her chest, her abdomen...

Ran swallows. She's really turned on right now. And Yukina probably knows it.

She gasps when Yukina suddenly sits her full weight down on her hips and pulls her back up by her tie. "Your jacket is in the way. Get rid of it.”

As if in a trance, Ran follows wordlessly, sliding the jacket off her shoulders and laying it on the backrest of the couch. The instant it's out of her hands, Yukina shoves her back down and takes her lips in a deep, hungry kiss. Yukina has her full attention now, but her hands make Ran's mind wander with them. She can feel Yukina swiftly undoing her tie, then running her hands back downward and supporting themselves on Ran's own arms, pinning her onto the couch and getting a feel of lean muscle all at once. It's such a Yukina approach that Ran feels her heart swell.

When they next break apart, Yukina stops to start unbuttoning Ran's shirt, and Ran catches her breath. "You like the suit?"

"You could say that," Yukina says. "I'd hate to ruin a dress, but a suit like this could handle some wear. Speaking of which, easy on the ass, would you?"

Ran's fingers loosen on Yukina's buttocks, but she gives one a playful smack, earning a small noise of surprise.

_ "Ran." _

"What?" Ran says, opting to lazily grind her hips into Yukina instead. "Your hands are all over me."

Yukina scoffs, muttering under her breath. "Better me than those girls."

"Huh?"

Yukina kisses Ran quiet, calming her and making her hands wander around her waist and her back instead. With a deft hand she slides the shirt collar away from Ran's neck and starts trailing kisses there, slowly inching down to her collarbone, then toward her chest.

Ran sighs, her body shifting into Yukina's touch, and her hands moving up to the back of Yukina's head and neck, but even as Yukina's lips travel down her body her mind starts to clear. "Yukina what — what did you mean when you said that?" 

Yukina only continues kissing and nipping down Ran's body, feeling her waist as her lips follow down. Ran's breathing is already getting heavy, and it's not long before Yukina's hands start to massage her thighs...

Okay, it's now or never.

"Yukina." Ran sits up and makes Yukina look at her with a firm grip on her shoulders. "What are you doing?"

"Seducing you," Yukina says flatly. "Successfully, I might add. Have you ever noticed that thing that happens with your voice when you get turned on?"

Ran's hand hovers to her throat. "My voi- Wait, don't avoid the question!"

"I answered it already." Yukina clambers up Ran's body to perch her weight on her shoulders, but Ran steadies herself with her arms behind her so that Yukina can't push her back down. "Ran."

"Yukina. What was that you said about 'those girls?' Is that why you're doing this?"

Yukina levels Ran with a hard stare. "You're quite popular tonight, Ran," Yukina says. "In a different way than in live houses. I'm used to feeling my competitive streak flare around you, but not when the competition isn't  _ you. _ "

Ran mulls over her words, her gaze piercing into Yukina's. "That's a funny way to say you were feeling a little jealous, isn't it?”

For a wordless moment, Yukina settles back down on Ran's lap, and her fingers trace Ran's collarbone with a featherlike touch. "Jealous," she repeats, turning the venom in the word into smooth nectar as it passes her lips. "I'd rather think of it as a streak of... possessiveness."

"Yukina." Ran's hands wrap around the sides of Yukina's waist, but there's only a thread of restraint keeping them from roaming up. "I'm not up for grabs. And if the fact that you've been all I could think about the whole night is any sign... you don't have any competition."

That's when Yukina pulls her in by her jaw until their lips are inches apart, and even just Yukina's  _ breaths _ , ragged and heavy as Ran's are, flood Ran with a maddening desire. Her eyes are hypnotic pools of gold. "Prove it."

A dangerous grin teases the corner of Ran's lips. "Don't tempt me," she says as her fingers shift and wrinkle blue cotton. "I don't want to ruin your dress, either."

There's barely an instant for Ran to catch something in Yukina snap before she finally makes that kiss that pushes Ran to the steepest edges of her inhibition. She uses her last vestiges of self-control to lean back, let Yukina crawl on top of her and feel her up while her own hands claw at the edges of the couch they lie on.

"That wasn't a request, Ran," Yukina whispers when she pulls away. "When I say prove it, you  _ satisfy _ me."

Ran runs her fingers through Yukina's hair, along the back of her head. "There's nothing I'd rather do."

The impulse to pull Yukina back in stops short when the door clicks. Moca peers inside, and her jaw falls slack.

The sight hauls Ran back to reality, and she'd almost have thrown Yukina off her had Yukina not been quicker to rise to her feet. "M-Moca!" Ran stammers as she haphazardly buttons her shirt back up. "It's not what you think!"

"No point lying," Yukina says, smoothing her hair with just the slightest hint of agitation. "Aoba-san, it's exactly what you think."

"Holy shit guys," Moca says. "Look, it's uh, been more than ten, so—" 

"I know!" Ran says, face red. "I know. Just..."

Moca holds her hands up innocently. "Hey, if you guys wanna get it on, by all means, but put a sign here or lock it or something so we don't kill the—"

"Moca, just go!"

"Whoa, okay, Hornball." But as Moca slides out, she pauses. "So  _ do _ you want me to lock it or?"

"Yes, lock the— I mean, no, we're not — agh...!" All at once, indecision chokes Ran up and heats her skin up to something feverish. "Just go, we'll figure it out!"

Moca whistles. "Okay, but don't go too wild, guys." She leaves on that irritating sing-song note, and Ran slumps back onto the couch, suddenly feeling a lot more tired than when she'd come in.

Yukina is kind enough to give her some ten or fifteen seconds to collect herself before speaking. "So do you... want the door locked?"

Ran flushes, again, but lightly enough not to be irritated. "If that means what I think it means... Yeah. A little."

"But we're not."

"No, no, ma'am."

They trade awkward smiles, and not all, but most of the heat in the room dissipates, giving way to a cool, sobering air.

Yukina chuckles to herself, then sighs. "In retrospect that was... quite impulsive of me."

Ran recognizes a rare moment of vulnerability in Yukina when she sees it, and stands up to wrap her arms around her from behind, nestling her head just over the crook of her neck. "Hey..." she says, voice soft, "I do love you, you know. We don't get to talk about it much, but I want you to know that. In case it wasn't enough before."

"Thank you," Yukina says. Her stare falls to the ground and she grasps at Ran's hand in a way that seems almost embarrassed. "I should apologize for making you think that I had any doubts."

"It's alright. This won't be a problem when our relationship is out."

Yukina smiles, and leans her head towards Ran's, and Ran thinks it's a sweet gesture until Yukina's voice lowers to a sultry whisper. "I'd still want you to show me, though."

Ran groans, planting a few playful kisses on Yukina's neck and tightening her hold on her. "You're gonna wear me out with this full devotion thing."

"I know you enjoy it, you wolf," Yukina chides. "I can tell you're still wound up, you know."

"That's your fault."

"Control yourself."

"Whatever, Miss 'I'm Seducing You.'"

Yukina laughs, and presses her lips to Ran's cheek. "Save your energy. You have something to prove to me tonight, after all."

Ran catches the end of Yukina's lips before she turns away. "I can't wait."

* * *

Lisa sees Moca's shit-eating grin as she closes the door, and she just knows.

"They weren't just talking, were they?"

Moca points her smile right at her and cocks a suggestive eyebrow. Lisa sighs.

**Author's Note:**

> btw if you guys got prompts I'm all ears! I'll never say if I accept them or not, though, just in case :( also before anyone tries, no, I probably won't ever do full-on smut or anything like that, sorry.
> 
> Comment what you liked and I might write faster! ;D


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